Method of heating railroad rails



Jan. 19, 1932. w. M. AKIN ET AL METHOD OF HEATING RAILROAD RAILS Filed Sept. 21, 1929 Patented Jan. 19, 19532 i I .WILLIIL'M M. AKIN AND LAFAYETTE YOUNG, 61E ALTON, ILLINOIS, ASSIGNORS TjO LA- inner CLEDE STEEL COMPANY, OF STJLO'UIS, MISSOURI A CORPORATION OF MISSOURI,

METHOD OF HEATING- BAILROAD RAILS Application filed September 21, 1929. Serial No. 394,194.

This invention relates generally to methroad rails preparatory to rero-lling the same,

the predominant object of the invention be ing to provide an improved method of applying heat to railroad rails ina furnace so as to avoid distortion and warpage of the rails.

Railroad rails are frequently heated preparatory to rerolling said rails in furnaces provided with sloping hearths formed of spaced ears, across which are fedthe rails to be heated. The rails are usually inserted into the furnace through an opening formed at the rear or side of the furnace, and are fed widthwise in file, across the hearth, until they approach the front wall of the furnace, at which point they are removed lengthwise through an opening formed in the side of the furnace. Owing to the fact that the hearth of the furnace must be wide in order to ac-- commodate the lengthwise dimension of the rails, and must be long to receive and support a large number of rails. duringthe heating operation, it becomes extremely dificult to apply heat properly and eficiently to this large area.

ferred to above to locate a luralit of burn n 7 1 ers in the front of tnezfurnace and to rely upon these burners alone in imparting heat heating the upper flange expands rapidly,

thereby warping the rail until it is supported only on its ends. By reason of becoming so warped the rail often turns over when the charge is fed downwardly across the hearth in the direction of the front wall of the furn ace, which tendency may result from the fact that the adjoining rails may not be so greatly distorted as the overturned rail, or

Heretofore it has been custom ary, in oil consuming furnaces, of the type retheends of the adjoining rails as heavily engaged in the brick work adjacent to the hearth. lhis overturning of therails oftencauses the material topile in the furnace even to the roof, and results in unequal heating of the rails, prevents further charging, and presents great difficulties in ejecting the piled mass from the furnace when it With the foregoing considerations in view, the present invention hasfor an important object thereofthe provision of an improved method of heating railroad railsso as to apply substantially uniform heat to the rails as they are fed through a furnace. In following out the improved method the rails: are heated equallyon the tops and bottoms thereof for a period of time until the critical point of expansion has been approximately.

reached, thereby causing equal expansion to both tops and bottoms of the rails, which eliminates warpage and causes-the rails to lie fiat throughout their entire traverse of the furnace. r

The object of the invention is accomplished by providing a furnace of the character referred to above with a plurality of burners, which are located in the front portion of the furnace for use in imparting heat to the top. portions of the rails located withinthe fur nace, and a plurality of burners at the back of the furnace and below the tops of the rails for heating the bottom portions of the rails.

Fig. 1 is a vertical section through. afurnace constructed was to permit the carrying out of our invention.

Fig. 2' is a fragmentary horizontal section through the furnaceillustrated in Fig. 1. As shown inthe drawings, the reference character 10 indicates the front wall of a furnace having side walls '12 and 14, a rear wall 16, and a roof 18. The hearth of the furnace indicated at 20 has formed at the rear thereof a bridge wall 22 and is provided on its under sidev with a plurality of air passages .24. The exposed upper surface of thehearth slopes along the area indicated; by the reference character 26 and is cut away at 28 to receive the spaced parallel skid bars,

} approaches the discharge point. a

or skid pipes 30, upon which the railroad rails 32 are adapted to he supported and fed.

A series of openings is formed within the rear wall of the furnace, and in each of these openings there is mounted a burner tile 34: composed of a heat resisting material and having the opening which. extends through the tile restricted near the outer end thereof. Located adjacent to the outer end of each of the tiles 34 is an oil burner 36 adapted to receive fuel from the supply conduit 38 and to be controlled by means of a valve 40.

In the operation of the furnace the rails 32 are fed across the furnace chargers 42 widthwise through an opening 44 in the rear wall of the furnace, downwardly across the skid bars 30, and are finally remove d through a discharge opening l6 formed in the side wall of the furnace. During the time that the rails are fed in this manner, heat is imparted to them by means of the flame from the burners 36 impinging upon the bridge wall 22, striking upon the roof 18, and being deflected downwardly upon the top portions of the rails. It is clear that heating the rails in this manner results in the top portions of the rails becoming heated more quickly than the lower portions thereof, resulting in unequal expansion and causing the rails to warp.

Infollowing out our improved method the furnace is provided with burners positioned preferably within the forward wall of the furnace. As illustrated, a series of low pressure burners 48 is located immediately beneath the junction of the skid bars 30 with the rear wall 10 of the furnace, and in the furnace illustrated a series of high pressure burners 50 is alternately arranged in staggered relation with the low pressure burn-ers 48. Individual valves are provided for each of the burners, and this arrangement permits use of the low pressure burners alone, the high pressure burners alone, or a combination of several of the high pressure burners with the low pressure burners, as may be desired. The skid bars 30 should be designed so that the length of skid will approximate the traverse time of the rails passing over so as to impart as near as possible enough heat to bottom portions of the rails to approach the lower critical expansion range, so that the rail will not bow upwardly.

It will be appreciated that the furnace must be constructed in such a manner that the heat and smoke generated by the Various burners will be conducted away from the furnace, and in the furnace illustrated in the drawings a flue 60, through which the hot gases pass from the furnace, is located directly beneath the auxiliary burners 48 and 50. To serve in preventing the heat generated by these burners from passing out directly through the flue, the furnace is equipped with arched walls 62, one of which is located beneath each of the auxiliary burners, thereby serving as a baflle in directing the heat from the burn ers toward the rear of the furnace beneath the supported rails.

This application is a continuation in part of an application filed by us on October 24, 1927, which matured into United States Patent No. 1,729, l1l, granted tSeptember 2st, 1929.

lVe claim:

1. The herein described method of heating elongated elements within a furnace, which comprises feeding said elongated elements through the furnace directing heat into the furnace from one end thereof at a point above the path of travel of said elongated elements so as to heat the upper portions thereof, and producing high and low pressure heat at the opposite end of the furnace below the path of travel of said elongated elements to heat the lower portions thereof.

2. The herein described method of heating elongated elements within a furnace, which comprises feeding said elongated elements widthwise through the furnace, directing heat into the furnace from one end thereof at a point above the path of travel of said elongated elements so as to heat the upper portions thereof, and directing high and low pressure heat into a furnace at the opposite end thereof below the path of travel of said elongated elements to heat the lower portions of said elongated elements.

3. The herein described method of heating elongated elements within a furnace, which comprises feeding said elongated elements through the furnace, directing heat into the furnace from one end thereof at a point above the path of travel of said elongated elements so as to heat the upper portions thereof, and directing independably controllable high and low pressure heat into the furnace at the opposite end thereof below the path of travel of said elongated elements to heat the lower portions of said elongated elements.

In testimony that we claim the foregoing we hereunto afiiX our signatures.

WILLIAM M. AKIN. LAFAYETTE YOUNG. 

